


The Stylist

by North_of_Kyrimorut



Series: Foxiyo Week 2020 [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, F/M, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Fluff, Post-Order 66 (Star Wars), Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, or at least as close as you can get to fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:42:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28441107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/North_of_Kyrimorut/pseuds/North_of_Kyrimorut
Summary: Wherein Fox reveals a hidden talent and Riyo makes a change.Foxiyo Week 2020 - Embarrassment : awkward, self-conscious, uneasy
Relationships: Riyo Chuchi/CC-1010 | Fox
Series: Foxiyo Week 2020 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2077149
Comments: 1
Kudos: 18





	The Stylist

**Author's Note:**

> My fandom-addled brain somehow dredged up the concept of color-crawlers from the dark recesses of my memory. I read _The Crystal Star_ once when I was eleven or twelve, but that scene of Leia dying her hair green with vomit bugs apparently really stuck with me.

Oh, this was an absolute embarrassment.

Riyo Chuchi, former member of the Galactic Senate and scion of one of the oldest houses on Pantora, stood in the refresher unit of an exceedingly sketchy spaceport motel room with a pair of scissors in one hand and a hank of hair in the other. She had taken the seemingly logical step of tying the length of her hair back and attempting to cut it at the fastener. It… had not gone well. One side now brushed her shoulder while the other was closer to her chin, and she was almost glad that she couldn’t twist around enough to see the back. She made a few more half-hearted snips at the longer section before wandering into the bedroom, the offensive tool still in hand.

Fox had no business looking so calm, so neat, and so—dare she say it?— _comfortable_ propped up on that lumpy bed. If the reformation of the Republic into the Empire a few months previous had turned Riyo’s world upside down, it had shattered Fox’s. None of which was apparent at the moment. He was reading a data pad, but spared a glance for her return. He made no comment until she flopped down across his legs.

“Problem?”

She responded by brandishing the scissors. He leaned forward to observe her handiwork, and, kark it, if he didn’t laugh.

“You might need a little help,” he said.

“Oh, I need help all right.” She held up a piece of her hair and surveyed the ends. “I should have paid my hair stylist more.”

“Well, I’m not a ‘stylist,’” he said, shifting his legs so that she had to get up with him. “But you don’t leave Kamino unless you can give yourself a crew cut in your sleep. Here, give over the scissors.”

“Am I getting a crew cut?” Riyo asked suspiciously.

“Would that be worse than?…” he gestured at the hackneyed state of her hair.

“I have two degrees, you know,” she complained, even as she dutifully handed over the scissors and followed him back to the ‘fresher.

“That’s nice,” he said in a tone he _had_ to have learned listening to chitchat at senatorial gatherings, “I’ve been cutting my own hair every month for the last seven years.”

It was the little details like that that made Riyo feel like she was still getting to know Fox. They had met years ago now, slowly becoming friends and then even more slowly becoming more-than-friends. She felt like she had known him as well as any other person. She certainly knew enough to love him. But now, after weeks of close quarters, she realized how much there still was to explore. Funny details, like how he would always choose a pastry with fruit in it if he had the option. Profoundly upsetting details, like the nightmares she had never had the opportunity to wake him up from before.

There were also the day to day nuances of living with another being. She now knew the set of his hands as he shaved away a few days’ worth of a beard and the precise way he cleaned his teeth even when he was half asleep. She could also see the way he scrunched at his hair in annoyance. And now she had another detail to fit in to the picture—he was used to maintaining his own hair, and he did not like being out of his routine.

“Are you going to keep growing your hair out?” she asked suddenly. “After all, the brothers wore so many different styles. I doubt that wearing it short will make you more or less recognizable.”

“Just one of those faces,” he commented. Riyo thought his smile belied the truth of that statement. Fox had a peculiar tip-tilted half-smile that suggested he had just heard some slightly distasteful joke and was amused in spite of himself. She had never seen _quite_ the same expression on another clone. “Let’s worry about _my_ hair some other time.”

He had her sit on the logical spot and moved the towel she had laid on the floor to catch the clippings. He was methodical as he corrected her slip-shod work and a neat, chin-length cut took shape under his hands. He carded his fingers through her hair thoughtfully, shaking out loose strands. “I could _probably_ add some wispy bits by your forehead,” he said, very serious. “If you want anything fancier than that, you should probably just find a tutorial on the HoloNet and try it yourself. Did you get anything to color it with?”

Trying not to laugh, Riyo declined the offer of ‘wispy bits’ and pointed to a packet of black color-crawlers. Fox snipped the packet open and carefully shook its contents on the top of Riyo’s head. They both watched as the semi-organic creatures did their job, her pinkish hair disappearing as the crawlers worked their way down.

“Should I try to maneuver some of these onto your eyebrows?” Fox asked. Not for the first time, Riyo was struck by what a methodical man he was. They had taken one great, romantic risk—deciding to stay together—but beyond that, their lives had become a series of practical, how-do-we-live actions and there was no one Riyo would have rather had by her side than Fox. He was rereading instructions on coloring hair with the same intensity as he hd given to Senate security reports. “And what about your eyelashes?”

“I have cosmetics for those things,” she said, not keen on the idea of color-crawlers so close to her sensitive eyes. “At least until I can do something more permanent.” She touched the makeup covering her clan markings. “I’m going to need to have these removed, too.”

Fox shifted a little to lean against the sink, arms folded. The ‘fresher was small enough that their legs touched. She knew what was going through his mind—that there was a chance that she could have gone back to Pantora, and lived her life in relative peace. He knew it just as keenly as Riyo knew he was stronger, faster, and smarter than she was and could have better disappeared alone. In the first few days after he deserted Coruscant and found her on Alderaan, they had both made the offer: _I can leave you, if you want. It might be safer._

Well, safer didn’t mean much in the Galactic Empire, and neither of them actually _wanted_ to leave the other. They had agreed not to continually bring up an option neither of them was willing to take. But it could be difficult to stick to that decision, when they were both continually faced with the little losses the other faced. For Riyo, it had been all of her life’s work and ambition. For Fox, it had been his core beliefs and the brothers that were closer than blood.

It was easy to be the one making the sacrifice, Riyo thought. It was much harder to be sacrificed _for._ Such was the nature of love. And if she struggled, Fox struggled tenfold. He had been born to be a hero, she thought, though he scoffed at the notion. Loyalty and selflessness was written into his very DNA, and it was a fearsome thing to be one he now settled all of that concentrated power on. Perhaps that should have made her more uneasy than it did—it was never wise to hold so much of one’s own heart in another’s chest, and they were both guilty of that. And yet, she had never felt so safe and so unworthy as she did running with Fox.

He laid his hands on her face, and the makeup smudged beneath his fingertips.

Riyo gave him a cheeky grin. “Don’t tell me you actually fell in love with me for my clan?”

He also smiled, but shook his head slowly. Another quirk that she had learned of Fox: he seldom allowed his attention to be redirected, and a lighthearted comment did nothing to distract him. He rubbed a thumb over the swell of her cheekbone and dropped his forehead momentarily to rest on hers. “You are a marvelous woman. _Practical._ ” Never one to let a moment linger, he dropped his hands away from her and started on the business of cleaning up.

 _Talk about practical,_ Riyo thought, fond. She followed his example by finishing her transformation. She darkened her eyebrows and adjusted the line of them, tinted her lashes, and touched up the blue foundation. Without the reflection of her clan tattoos, the warm gold of her eyes stood out starkly against the unrelentingly cool tones of her skin and new hair color. It was a stranger who looked back at her from the slightly warped and questionably clean mirror, and that was as it should be. Senator Riyo Chuchi would have never been in this room, in the sector, with this man. But this other Pantoran—this clanless woman with her practical short, dark hair— _was_ here, taking her first steps into the future with the man she loved.

And for that, Riyo would face any embarrassment. Even a bad haircut. 


End file.
